CART UPDATED!
2023-10-24
Sharon Starkey
USA
This Brunello tour was very interesting. Our driver for just the 2 of us--no one else signed up I guess, was intelligent and passionate about the wine in this area. He gave us a very in depth history lesson about the area and the wine there. We appreciated that a lot. Now for the wines. The first stop was excellent. We had a lovely tour of the winery and moved on to the tasting. The wines we tasted were excellent BUT this wine is best with some food. It would have been lovely to have a bit of food to taste with the delicious big reds. A bit of salami, cheese and bread??? I mean we paid $500 for the 2 of us to do this tour. I thought that we could have had a little more to ea there. But the wines were wonderful and we ordered some to ship home. Then we went to the next one--and the last one. This is were we had lunch too. Ok, we were there to drink Brunellos but this winery had sold out of the 2018 Brunellos so we could not taste any! What??? We were given extremely teeny tastes of the 2019--not even released yet because it is too early--albeit by only a couple months but still! The tastings were very small and even with lunch we did not get a glass of wine to drink with our very nice lunch. We were then given some other tastings and a small tasting of one of their neighbors brunellos. HUH??? Very very disappointing. Why did we go there and not to another winery that had some 2018s to taste? Why didn't we get to taste a 2017 or '16? We paid premium prices for this tour--more than I have ever paid before and we have done many around the world--Argentina, Australia, Spain, Portugal, of course in US too--but this felt like a rip off. Our tour ended with an hour in Montecino. We walked around a bit and then went to a wine bar and ordered a glass of wine. We had not had a proper glass all day. We don't drink to get drunk, buzzed, etc. But we expected a glass of wine with lunch--right? We enjoyed parts of it very much and our driver was excellent but come on, let us drink some Brunello. Cannot recommend this tour. It was not a good value for us at all.
Brunello the Big Red Tour
Sharon Starkey
USA
This Brunello tour was very interesting. Our driver for just the 2 of us--no one else signed up I guess, was intelligent and passionate about the wine in this area. He gave us a very in depth history lesson about the area and the wine there. We appreciated that a lot. Now for the wines. The first stop was excellent. We had a lovely tour of the winery and moved on to the tasting. The wines we tasted were excellent BUT this wine is best with some food. It would have been lovely to have a bit of food to taste with the delicious big reds. A bit of salami, cheese and bread??? I mean we paid $500 for the 2 of us to do this tour. I thought that we could have had a little more to ea there. But the wines were wonderful and we ordered some to ship home. Then we went to the next one--and the last one. This is were we had lunch too. Ok, we were there to drink Brunellos but this winery had sold out of the 2018 Brunellos so we could not taste any! What??? We were given extremely teeny tastes of the 2019--not even released yet because it is too early--albeit by only a couple months but still! The tastings were very small and even with lunch we did not get a glass of wine to drink with our very nice lunch. We were then given some other tastings and a small tasting of one of their neighbors brunellos. HUH??? Very very disappointing. Why did we go there and not to another winery that had some 2018s to taste? Why didn't we get to taste a 2017 or '16? We paid premium prices for this tour--more than I have ever paid before and we have done many around the world--Argentina, Australia, Spain, Portugal, of course in US too--but this felt like a rip off. Our tour ended with an hour in Montecino. We walked around a bit and then went to a wine bar and ordered a glass of wine. We had not had a proper glass all day. We don't drink to get drunk, buzzed, etc. But we expected a glass of wine with lunch--right? We enjoyed parts of it very much and our driver was excellent but come on, let us drink some Brunello. Cannot recommend this tour. It was not a good value for us at all.
Brunello the Big Red Tour